Leveling Up Wives In The Apocalypse

"You cut your own hand off," Mathew muttered, opening his eyes wide when he finally noticed a makeshift bandage covering the stump that used to be the woman's hand.

'I've heard of stuff like this happening back in my old life... But damn, it takes some determination to go through with it.'

The awe flashed in Mathew's eyes... Only for him to shake his head before approaching the lifeless woman on the van's floor.

"You should know the drill already..." Mathew then muttered, only to omit the entire searching part and focus on grabbing the attractive young adult of a woman into his hands before carrying her out of the van and moving towards the gate.

"Everyone, we are pulling out!" he then shouted, alerting all his wives still on the field.

"Can't we keep on hunting?" Leila protested, appearing right beside Mathew's side. "We killed a lot of zombies but we didn't really bother to gather the cores yet," she pointed out. "And if your guess about the evolved monsters is correct, leaving all those corpses out in the open..."

The girl didn't need to finish her words.

"You are right," Mathew muttered right as the two of them reached the gate and passed through before letting the hand-deprived woman down on the ground. This time, however, rather than placing her right beside the other two, Mathew made sure to leave several meters of space between her and the others.

"Where the hell is Kasper," Mathew then cursed, looking around in hopes of seeing the hunter returning already.

Yet, Mathew's expectations this time were far too great for the reality on his hand. The time he had to take to pull a single person out of the van and bring them back was far smaller than the time a normal person needed to first climb all the way up to the top floor of the school and then go back while moving around between different means of climbing up.

"Mat, decision, we need it now!" Leila then called out. She stood guard by the small gate, still refusing to close it back.

"Fuck!" Mathew cried out only to stand up and brandish his saber. "We are going out!" he then shouted, making his way out of the gate only to nearly instantaneously clash with the wave of the zombies appearing from the now right side of the street.

And so, rather than taking care of the survivors that were in a dire need of help and supplies, Mathew ended up cutting and slashing like usual.

'This isn't enough,' he quickly realized when he was forced to take a step back due to all the zombie corpses pilling up and making the ones behind them climb up and attack him from above. 'I guess it's time for me to use it again,' he thought, gritting his teeth as he prepared for the backlash of using his ability.

"Mind's flesh!" Mathew then shouted, following the example set by Carol whenever she would invoke her own abilities. And as soon as his mouth opened, Mathew focused all his mind on the picture of gathering the cores from the corpses lying all over the place.

"Ugh..." a dull, pained moan then escaped from Mathew's mouth. His body slumped down for but a second, as if the gravity of the entire world reversed and the weight of the entire planet now rested upon his shoulders.

The unpleasant side effects were kind enough to vanish after just a short moment, allowing Mathew to raise his weapon and deflect the incoming zombie's hand right in the nick of time.

Or actually, he turned out to be too late to do so. This time, rather than his blade, it was his vitality that warded off the attack, preventing the zombie's sharp nails from cutting his face open.

'Fuck,' Mathew thought, standing back up to his legs and cutting the daring undead down, 'that was close.' He then raised his saber and started to cut the zombies open again.

And then, the burden that he willingly took on himself finally started to bring some results, as a plethora of about twenty shadowy hands suddenly grew out of his back.

Mathew didn't need to control them at all. He already infused them with his intent. And while he continued to produce more and more work for his mind's flesh, the hands diligently rushed to rip the skulls of the fallen zombies open before tearing the cores out of their brains.

The blood splattered all over the street with pieces of skulls and brains flying in every possible direction. And soon, this gruesome sight rewarded everyone with a picture of a nicely tacked pile of cores, only waiting for someone to take them and make proper use of them.

'Not enough,' Mathew thought after stealing a quick glance at the situation around. 'We are killing them faster than I can gather the cores,' he thought, gritting his teeth.

In the short term, it meant that unless the zombie waves were to suddenly exhaust and stop, they would continue to gather as many cores as they could ever need. Yet, if the waves were not to stop but intensify instead, there would be no telling just how many evolved monsters would appear right at the school's barrier!

"I'm back!" Kasper shouted, appearing at the backside gate of the school's fence. "I brought stuff and woke everyone up, they are coming here now!" he called.

'And that's how we can salvage the situation,' Mathew instantly connected the dots.

Even with his mind's flesh, even with the girls helping out whenever they weren't busy warding off the zombies, they couldn't keep up with the number of zombies entering the slaughterhouse on the street. But with fifty hands ready to help them out with the task... the situation would change!

"Once they come, make them wrap some cloth around their hands. And whether they like it or not, if they want to live, they have to help us out!"